


let's be lucky people

by donutcats



Category: Gossip Girl
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-21
Updated: 2018-03-21
Packaged: 2019-04-05 08:45:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14040498
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/donutcats/pseuds/donutcats
Summary: Letting herself think of Dan as she reads leads to hearing other things in Dan’s voice. Remembering things he’s said to her. For a bit, she’s angry at herself, angry that this is meant to be her coming of age era and she can’t go long without thinking of him.Without hearing him in the hallway of some mansion in the woods, telling her how unconditionally loved she was. Hearing his voice list off all her better qualities.





	1. Part 1

**Author's Note:**

> this is takes place at least some time after 6x02, mostly because that's as far as I've gotten and because I refuse to accept any of the spoilers for the end I've heard of. So, I'm making my own ending. I've never traveled in my life, and everything I've written is thanks to google, so if anything's wrong you're welcome to call me out. 
> 
> also, this is going to be my longest fic to date and it's for a fandom that's probably dead lmao. tbf I'm a pro at joining dead fandoms and writing things, so it fits my MO.
> 
> oh and title taken from Lucky People by Waterparks, because I listened to it on loop while writing most of this.

Blair Waldorf has something close to an emotional breakdown. She wouldn't specifically call it a breakdown, because that would mean admitting to breaking down in the first place. Blair does not break down. Even when Dorota finds her sitting in the middle of a very messy office, a paper crumbled in her hand, and tears streaming down her face. _Hyperventilating_ , Dorota had the gall to say. And Blair will admit, it was a tad hard to breathe, all those tears clogging up her throat, some textile report ruined in one hand and the other clutching at the cotton of her dress skirt.  
  
She had something just south of a break down, all that stress weighing on her. She was probably just tired, yes that explains it all. So she let Dorota lead her home, help her into a silk pajama set, and tuck her into bed, reminding Blair of when she was a child. Crying over problems that seemed so insignificant now, holding onto Dorota's skirts and forgetting for just the night that Dorota was the help, and not warm arms and an accent heavy voice that lulled her to sleep when her mother was too busy.  
  
It’s just the stress. Much like all the times before, all she needed was some bed rest. She doesn't want to dwell on the small detail that this is not a singular event, that this is not the first time she has drained herself completely trying to strive for perfection, and Blair knows with a surety that only comes from being who she is, that it won't be the last. Blair doesn't like to dwell on things she can't change, but she dwells anyways.

She realizes quite quickly that it probably wasn't just stress. The next morning, Blair wakes up feeling content, stretching from a pleasant dream. As if yesterday hadn't happened. There is one thought on her mind as she sits up; she wanted to go see a film. She hadn't seen one in so long, it's well overdue. After changing into something comfortable yet still the height of fashion, Blair makes her way down to the first floor, already thinking if she wanted to attend alone or ask Dorota to follow along.  
  
The sight of a white board set up between the two columns leading into the sitting room make her freeze, the toes of her flats almost scuffing along the hardwood. Dorota scribbles something down, and it hits her in that moment that she was in the middle of a scheme.

Blair was planning something, to get her back into her mother's good graces, to propel herself upwards on the social and business ladder alike. How could she forget that? Just the sight of the post cards stuck to the corners of the board cause her to sit down heavily on the sofa. Her hand drifts up to her chest, fingers curling into the dip of her collarbone.  
  
"Miss Blair, you ok?" Dorota turns, askance, dry erase marker poised in the air. The thought of diving back into the scheme, of ordering people around and filling out paperwork and striving for perfection, it catches in her throat. Everything from yesterday rushes back to her, crashing into her morning bliss.  
  
Blair shakes her head, remembering the way she couldn't remember the last time she ate before last night, before Dorota made her. This is becoming a pattern, Blair thinks, and Blair only likes patterns on dresses.

She goes and sees the film, alone, and to her utter delight the Film Forum is playing _Sabrina_ . Blair could never pass up an Audrey Hepburn movie, especially when she was in such a terrible mood. Halfway through, she has to walk out, the notes of _La vie en rose_ nipping at her heels.  
  
Once she gets home, secured behind the door of her bedroom, she finds she must truly hate herself, or at least love the idea of hurting herself emotionally. Using the excuse that she left the movie much too early and wasn’t able to hear it fully through, Blair plays _La vie en rose._ Before the song has even ended, she finds herself putting in on loop, listening as she changes into something more appropriate for lounging about the house and doing absolutely nothing.

The Harry Winston sits against her sternum, catching the light of her lamp. It reminds her that Chuck hasn't called lately. The last time she saw him, he gave her one of his signature smirks, brushing his lips so close to her skin, leaving a ghost of a kiss in his wake.

There's something in her chest that's shaking, vibrating through her bones, along her skin, causing her fingers to tremble and her throat to quiver. Everything feels like too much, even as she sits alone in her bedroom in silence. Everything on the horizon feels like _too much_ all of a sudden.  
  
Something catches her eye, tucked away amongst a stack of papers on her desk. When she pulls it out, the glossy pamphlet with the title _Where to Roam in Rome_ greets her, like an old friend, and it causes the shaking that's made it's home deep in her chest to rattle at her ribcage.  
  
Within the hour, her eyes are dry if a bit red, she has two bags packed, and she's called Dorota to inform her that she should take a vacation. A long one. There's a one-way ticket to Rome waiting for her at La Guardia.

 

===

 

It's ironic, really, the one place she decided to run off to was also the same place she abandoned. Emotionally, of course. She left the idea of Italy behind the same night she chose Chuck. Dan and Italy somehow became synonymous in her mind at some point, yet here she is, a rolling suitcase and carry on clutched in her hands as she stares at the Roman skyline.  
  
This is not for him, she tells herself. This is not for anyone. This is her, running from her responsibilities because she had something that could be labeled an emotional breakdown if one did not know how to properly work a label machine. The pamphlet Dan got her is stuffed into the bottom of her large Birkin bag, and she doesn't give it any sort of thought as she hails a cab.  
  
Blair checks into her hotel, and she knows she'll have to have a talk with her mother at some point. Explain or placate, depending on Eleanor's mood, but for now she sinks into the large bathtub and orders macaroons. She'll give herself a day, she thinks. One day to sulk in Rome, to think about all the what if's and could have beens, to wonder about the words she'll have for her mother, for _Chuck_ . And then she'll move on.  
  
She will commit to this high end nomadic lifestyle, because it's three in the morning and she's tired and she doesn't know who she is or who she wants to be.

 

===

 

After lying to herself and spending two days in Rome, one day for moping and reevaluating her life and spending at least two hours contemplating going back because what a mess of a decision this was. The other day spent in retail therapy, taking time to stare at all the Roman art, and on the phone with her mother, trying her best to pitch the idea that this would be _good_ for Blair, some time away just by herself. Chuck calls her, twice, and she declines, twice.

The something in her chest gives a guilty rattle as she does, but she can’t find it in herself to speak to him. Not right now. She does send him a text, short and sweet and hopefully explanatory enough.

_I just need some time alone, to think._

Blair finds herself falling asleep in a train car that night, heading north.

 

===

 

A handful of weeks later, enough that one would consider it a few months at the very least, Blair is sitting in a small cafe in Copenhagen, along the canal. She sits by a window, a mug filled with coffee sits next to a worn looking book.  
  
It’s a paperback copy of _The Great Gatsby_ , looking like it’s been read front to back too many times. Blair saw it in a bookstore in Munich, and something made her stand in line with it clutched to her chest. In all honesty it’s not the best book she’s ever read, but it’s special in some way that Blair doesn’t really want to think about.

The characters are a bit convoluted, Daisy is an apex bitch, and Blair is pretty sure Nick Carraway has the biggest gay crush on Gatsby this side of the Hudson.

But she continues to read it, flipping past entire chapters to find snippets and quotes she actually liked. Sometimes, she can hear his voice in some of the lines, and she can tell without a shadow of a doubt why Fitzgerald is one of Dan’s literary inspirations.

It’s times like this where she let’s herself think about Dan. As she sips on expensive coffee and reads pretentious classics, she allots herself these moments for him. Somewhere after Munich, after sitting in her hotel room with a new book in her lap and the memory of Dan’s smile as he tried to defend the better points of Gatsby, she admitted to herself that while this adventure is for nobody but herself, she can’t forget about him.

At one point, he was her best friend. He slid into the space Serena left vacant, held her in his arms when she felt as if she were coming apart at the seams. He was special in a way no one had been in a very, very long time. And then he was more, but still the same. Dan Humphrey somehow managed to balance the edge of best friend and boyfriend so spectacularly.

Blair flips through more pages, settling on one of the more memorable quotes, one that she found in a SparkNotes list last year when Dan had first mentioned the book and she wanted to know about it without actually reading it.

 

_He had one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life. It faced, or seemed to face, the whole external world for an instant and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor. It understood you just as far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself._

 

The coffee is almost cold, as she sips at it, and she’s once again reminded of the way Dan would smile at her whenever he was particularly pleased with himself. A genuine stretch of his lips that reeled her in and made Blair feel encapsulated in whatever joke he was making, whether at her expense or not.

With a huff, Blair closes the book. She refuses to compare Nick and his very homosexual love for Gatsby with any sort of feelings she could ever have for Dan. I mean, who even writes a sentence like that if they aren’t planning on bedding the person at least once?

 

===

 

Lights sparkle off of the Thames, small crowds of people making their way to and fro, coats bundled close against the winter chill. London in the winter is a grey freezing mess.

Blair once again finds herself in a bathtub in the middle of the night, watching the world roll by as she soaks. Instead of macaroons she has a bottle of wine this time, which is almost empty. Her copy of _Gatsby_ sits on the ledge farthest from the water, a red pen somewhere on the floor from when it had slipped out of her hand and she left it to it’s fate.

She’s taken to marking up the paperback, like a stern teacher with a sharp eye. At first it started as a way to vent her frustrations at the book, at the way Daisy was treated and treated others in return, at the terrible puppy dog eyes Carraway seemed to melt into every word about Gatsby himself. But tonight, halfway into the bottle as she refilled the bath with warm water, she entertained the idea of showing it to Dan. Of shoving it at him smugly, wanting him to see all the things that could have been better. She underlines certain lines that she reads in his voice, and wildly she wants him to see that too. Wants him to know she can hear him, read him.

Letting herself see Dan in the book leads to hearing other things in Dan’s voice. Remembering things he’s said to her. For a bit, she’s angry at herself, angry that this is meant to be her coming of age era and she can’t go long without thinking of him.

Without hearing him in the hallway of some mansion in the woods, telling her how unconditionally loved she was. Hearing his voice list off all her better qualities.

Sinking further into the water, feeling the water lap at the hair she twisted atop her head, she wonders how she can be strong and independent when all she wants is to talk to him. Blair wants to tell him about her travels, she wants to explain how she saw _Inside_ tucked into a shelf of some bookshop in Cardiff. All the foreign films she’s seen, and the artwork, and the pretentious books that make her think of him and how he’d know they’re horrible but still find some fondness in them.

His voice come to her again, unbidden. _Until Chuck Bass decides he’s ready for you._ Harry Winston sits next to _Gatsby_ , chain threaded through it, and Blair stares at it as she finished off the wine. Chuck has only contacted her once in the last five months, after her small text. It was a phone call, beginning with asking if she was ok and ending with him needing to get back to his revenge plot on his recently resurrected father.

Maybe she was asking too much from him, maybe she’s too drunk currently to think logically, but he didn’t even say he missed her. He didn't say he loved her. He spun some sort of speech intricately in the way only Chuck can, about how much he needs her, how much he wishes he had her brilliant scheming brain. But never once a simple I love you.

But when was Blair Waldorf ever a girl for simple?

 

===

 

Two months later she’s standing in the Musée d'Orsay, and there’s a sick sense of irony that one of her favorite places on the planet is slowly becoming filled with her saddest memories.

If she closes her eyes, Blair can imagine the first time she met Louis, leagues before everything crumbled around her. The way he smiled at her and made her feel golden, the lightness in her chest as she limped out with only one shoe. Back then, she knew who she was, who she wanted to be.

Someone clears their throat, causing Blair to snap her eyes open, pulling her from the memories of Louis she has stored away, soft around the edges from when she loved him. Turning, she catches sight of a canary yellow tie, which in turn is connected to one Chuck Bass. Of course he’d find a way to match her dress, consciously or not.

“Blair.” He greets, tucking his blackberry into the inner packet of his navy suit jacket.

“Chuck.” She greets back, turning back to the painting in front of them. She wasn’t really paying attention to what is was when she walked up to it, and even now she’s more focused on the way Chuck shifts then looking closely at it or any plaque.

“Was there a reason you called me to meet you, besides staring at Monet?”

Well, now she _must_ pay attention. If only to correct him. Without missing a beat, she takes stock of the painting in an instant. “Actually, it’s Vermeer. But yes, there is a reason you’re here.” Her clutch clicks open, and then she’s taking Chuck’s hand, chain and Harry Winston pooling in his open palm. The look he gives her is part shocked, part wounded, and part furious.

His fingers curl around the jewelry, knuckles turning white. “Care to explain? Or would you rather I tuck my tail between my legs and leave while you melodramatically stare at a painting.”

“Don’t be melodramatic yourself, Chuck. It’s unbecoming.” Blair turns fully to face him, both hands wrapped around her clutch. “I’ve done much soul searching these last seven months, which one is wont to do when traipsing across Europe, and I assure you this wasn’t a spur of the moment decision. It was many small moments piled atop of each other and- I realized I wasn’t happy, Chuck. I’m tired of waiting. If we can’t give all of ourselves to each other right now, and still piece our lives together, then how are we ever going to survive?”

Chuck is silent as he tucks the ring into his pocket, movements almost jerky, a scowl etching his face. He’s staring off at some point on the floor that Blair can’t pick out. Then, he turns, and they’re face to face, eye to eye, and she can see the fight under his skin. She can hear the argument bubbling in his throat, accusations and apologies in equal measure.

She meant it when she said she was tired.

“I’ll always love you Chuck, but not in the way you want to be loved.”

Blair presses a kiss to his cheek, brushes her nose along his cheekbone, her fingertips along his hand. It’s as close to a sorry as he’s willing to hear. Then, she’s walking away. hoping just this once he won’t follow her.

 

===

 

Blair doesn't spend all of her time away in Europe, but she doesn’t step back onto New York soil. Not yet. She flies back to America, decides to spend some time in L.A. Tries to understand what made Serena fall so hopelessly in love with the city.  
  
It's constantly warm, is the first thing Blair notes. Well, the first thing she notes is how most of California seems to wear some form of hippie chic, which she curls her lip at. The temperature though, is a very close second. The two thoughts happen almost simultaneously. She can consider them both first thoughts if she pleases. It's the middle of March, a beautiful spring afternoon anywhere else, and yet the Los Angeles sun beats down heavy and hard, distorting the air that comes off the pavement.  
  
Everything seems golden, shiny and glitzy with just enough edge. It sparkles in ways that Manhattan doesn't. The palm trees reach skyward down every road, towering over the shop windows that glint in the sun. She walks down Rodeo Drive, and she can see Serena in everything she passes. She can see the stretch of her smile and the wave of her hair and the bold colors of her wardrobe. Serena is golden and all legs and she's perfect for California.  
  
Blair buys a pair of Jimmy Choo wedges that make her think of Serena, of days at the beach and boho skirts. She packs them into her suitcase, imagining how wonderful they'd look in the Hamptons, and she leaves two days later for Prague. L.A isn't for her.

 

===

 

She spends her one year anniversary abroad in Athens, sitting on a balcony in a white linen sundress and a bowl of fresh fruit by her side. The ocean crashes in the distance, the curtains billow out the open door, and Blair Waldorf feels content. She feels like she’s the star of a foreign film and her happy ending is somewhere on the horizon.

The thing that lives in her chest trembles less frequently lately, but once in awhile she’ll feel it. When she watches _Rosemary’s Baby_ , when she hears the _Ramones_ crackling from a radio.

When Serena calls for the first time in a long time, Blair picks up almost immediately, and Serena sounds so happy and glowing.

She learns Nate filed for bankruptcy on the Spectator, before an anonymous benefactor decided to step in. They’ve yet to figure out who the mystery person is, not for lack of trying. Lily and Rufus are on engagement number three, but by the way Serena’s voice tightens whenever the topic is mentioned, Blair suspects there’s going to be an engagement number four by next summer.

Chuck’s doing as well as Chuck can, but Blair realized awhile ago that no matter how fiercely she loves Chuck Bass, it’s not her job to fix him. Especially when he doesn’t truly want to be.

Eric has a boyfriend, one that isn’t Jonathan and actually has the potential to stick around. Not once does Serena mention Dan, or anything Dan related, or even vaguely Humphrey shaped unless it’s to remark on Rufus in some way. The thing in her chest wishes she would, wishes to hear his name in someone else’s voice beside Blair’s own.

It would make him real, in some weird way that she’s convinced herself. Because Dan has been nothing but a name in her head for a year, a name only spoken aloud in her most desperate moments when she wasn’t thinking. The only thing she has from him is a crinkled Roman pamphlet, and memories she flips through like a scrapbook.

She’s accepted the fact that her coming of age story will have to include Daniel Humphrey in a footnote. In a small honorable mentions section. But it’s not about him. She reminds herself of this as she listens to Serena’s life without Dan in it, as she wishes he was still apart of the UES, if only for her to know how he is without having to stoop so low as to actually ask him herself.

“How are you, B?” Serena finally asks, in that drawling, edging on slurred tone of hers, just one wrong turn from melancholy at all times.

Blair hums, tucks her knees close to her chest, the old fashioned receiver wedged between her face and shoulder. “I’m eating fruit for breakfast on a windswept balcony, I’m halfway through _This Side of Paradise_ , and I’m fairly certain I’m close to bringing Grecian gowns back into style. All in all? I’m ok, S. I’m going to be ok.”

 

===

 

A good chunk of her time is spent in Lyon, with her father and Roman. She wakes up to warm mornings and eats sandwiches in the afternoons, swims in the pool as the sun dips low. It feels like a vacation within a vacation. A safe pocket of bliss within the constant worry of _what’s next_.

Blair knows she needs to go back, some day. She needs to face the music, so to speak. Give actual explanations on why she fled, why she needed something new in her life.

Until then, she’ll continue to try and pick up new hobbies, new activities that catch her eye in each new city she settles in. There was painting in Berlin, gardening in Brussels, even a very brief stint dancing in Amsterdam that was not as scandalous as it sounds. She tried glass blowing which she failed spectacularly at, she even tried her hand at various internships of anything she could find.

But nothing felt right. Or she quit because she couldn’t _do_ anything right. She’s too controlling for most things, Blair wants everything an exact certain way or not at all, and it causes friction in about oh, everything. Her scheming ways have calmed down a bit, because she noticed that she’s sick of self sabotaging just because she’s not happy with something. There have been times that she missed on something good because it wasn’t exactly what she wanted, and she didn’t want that happening any more.

Now, instead of scheming, if she’s unhappy she finds herself quitting entirely. Which, ok maybe isn’t the best way to go about things but. Baby steps are essential.

Blair learns how to play the piano, or well she learns in the way one picks up a skill long thought dead, rusty and unpractised. She had a tutor when she was younger, when she was even brattier than she is now, and once she bit the old woman’s fingers because she wouldn’t stop pointing at Blair and telling her what she was doing wrong. That was the last piano lesson.

Her father’s manor has a music room, a grand piano framed by floor to ceiling windows, the edges filigreed and beautiful. Predictably, the first song Blair teaches herself is _La vie en rose_ . She watched _Sabrina_ all the way through one night, and the next morning she sat on the bench, fingers hovering over the keys, in nothing but pajamas and her hair a mess because there was no one here to impress. No one here that needed to be convinced she was perfect and uncracked.

She teaches herself _Moon River_ next, and she thinks that is more for her than anything else.

After that it seemed like the piano was one of the few things that felt like her own. Like something someone in her life hasn’t already done. Like something Serena hasn’t pioneered before her.

Roman listens, weeks later, as she quietly sings along to the first song she taught herself. He claps, genuinely so proud of her, praise coming so easily about her voice, but Blair knows she can’t become a singer. Some teen idol or indie hit. It’s not a mantle that feels comfortable. But, for now, it’s something that makes her happy, and that feels like enough.

 

===

 

Italy feels off limits in some odd way, like a bunch of mental blockades have been set up all around it’s border, Blair Waldorf not permitted beyond this point. As if Dan Humphrey has some invisible claim on an entire country all because he fell into some melancholic downward spiral aided by Georgina Sparks of all people.

It’s an annoyance really, an inconvenience that she’s managed to skirt around for almost two whole years by now. She continues to scoff at the notion of someone from her past emotionally barring her from someplace all because her chest rattles whenever she thinks about him alone in Rome, alone with Georgina hanging off is his arm and-

She books a hotel in Rome and swears to reclaim Italy. It’s not his, he doesn’t own it. Just because there are probably remnants of his heart scattered amongst the Tuscan countryside along with crumpled up papers and discarded words, it doesn’t _mean_ anything.

This isn’t about Dan, she reminds herself, like a mantra. He gets a footnote, a quick dedication. A thank you in the acknowledgements. She fucked him over and he hasn’t been thinking about her, so he doesn’t deserve so many of her own emotions and thoughts poured into how he’s doing at five in the morning on a weeknight as she lays awake in Prague.

Blair stands in front of the _Trevi_ , the fountain large and imposing while still holding a fantastical beauty. It’s very touristy of her, very low brow American, to seek out one of the most popular fountains in Rome, to stand and stare and snap a picture or two. Packed like a sardine in the crowd, but she couldn’t help it.

She missed it, missed the sounds and smells. Next to France, Italy was once her favorite country. Rome and Milan, Tuscany and Florence. Venice, Naples. It held exquisite history and art and culture. France is delicately spun pastels, chiffon and twinkling lights. Italy is earth tones, savory pasta and marble. They feel like two halves of who Blair wants to be.

Her palms dig into the railing around the _Trevi_ , knuckles almost white as someone bumps her from behind. Spinning around, Blair has an insult on the tip of her tongue, so scathing she hopes it makes whomever jostled her cry.

“Whoa, sorry- _Blair?_ ”

The words lodge in her throat, her knuckles bloodless, as she stares at a mop of hair and a band tshirt that looks much too worn and soft. Her throat clicks, and the disbelieving look on his face causes her voice to tumble from her.

“You should be sorry, you almost pushed me clean into the fountain. I know we haven’t seen each other in awhile, but I’d at least hope you wouldn’t stoop to something so low.”

The crowd moves, families coming and going all around, but all Blair sees is Dan, all she hears is Dan. This is her story god dammit, what is he doing here? And why is the thing that bought permanent real estate behind her lungs trying to claw its way through her chest.

Dan shifts his messenger bag, steps back to allow a couple to move by, but then he’s moving forward again, so close, dipping his head to look at her. “If I _were_ to push you into a fountain, wouldn’t the _Trevi_ be up to every one of your standards?” There’s a curl to his lips, and their banter might not be what it once was, but it’s something.

There still a spark of hurt in his eyes when he looks at her, she can see it. But he still looks like this is the best surprise he could have gotten today. It fills her with some sort of confidence, it gives her the jump start in her heart to smooth down the nonexistent wrinkle in her cream colored skirt and ask him if he’d like to grab a coffee with her.

His surprise doubles, but if she can still read him like she used to, then so does the kernel of happiness he’s holding tight to.

 

\---

 

It’s quiet and awkward for the first few minutes, sitting at a table outside of a cafe across from Dan, both of them fidgeting in their own ways, words measured and holding back.

He orders a black coffee, adds two packages of sugar, the branded type that sit in neat little rows in a small tray. Without missing a beat as he speaks, a mild topic about how crowded the _Trevi_ was today, he slides three packets towards Blair. Her ribs clack together, as she rips into the sugar, as she realizes, even after all this time, he remembers how she likes her coffee.

“So, how have you been?” Blair, asks, just as mildly, cutting off whatever complaints about tourism he was halfway through.

Dan presses his lips together, coffee mug hovering close to his face. His eyebrow ticks, head tilts. “I’ve been ok.” _I’m ok, S. I’ll be ok._ “I’ve been living in Boston for the past year and a half.”

“I hear Boston is nice.” Still mild, yet interested. Masking the excited thrum under skin that his voice elicits.

The mug clicks against the table, Dan shifts in his chair, giving a unaffected shrug. She knows him though, can see the tense line of his shoulders under his shirt. “Yeah, it is. I uh,” The line of his shoulders pull taught, and he runs a hand through his hair. Nerves seem to drip from his every movement. “I was trying to publish a tell all book, think _Inside_ but ramped up at least twenty levels. Real names, real everything. I realized it wasn’t the best I could do though, after Nate stopped talking to me. So, I dropped the idea and moved to someplace with a lot less ghosts.”

He ends it with a shrug and a self deprecating smile, the familiar type that settles warm in Blair’s stomach. She sort of hates it, on some intrinsic level. The smile, not the feeling. Or maybe that too.

It’s just a smile, but it feels like an olive branch held between them. It’s just a smile but it seems to unlodge something that was stuck behind her teeth, under her tongue, and before she knows it they’re on their second coffee and she’s telling him stories about her time abroad.

She tells him about spending time in Poland, not long because she made the terrible mistake of visiting in the winter, but she did pick up some small trinkets and made sure to overnight post them to Dorota.

Prague and the colorful buildings and rich history and the warm feeling that seemed to radiate from every brick and stone. How there was something old about Prague, something beneath the ground that she only ever felt in Rome or Athens alike.

Without thinking she mentions the bookshop in Munich, the one she found only a few days into her unplanned vacation, paying for _The Great Gatsby_ with the change in her pocket, because she had yet to speak to her mother and she didn't want to chance a paper trail. She doesn’t mention how it felt important enough to spend her last penny on.

“You watch too many crime shows. A _paper trail_.” Dan remarks, teasingly, but there’s a pleased note in his voice, in the way he taps his fingers against the table. She resists the urge to snap at him, to tell him to not flatter himself. Instead she changes the subject, grabs at the creamer and adds too much to her coffee.

A good bit of the conversation is taken over by her accounts of the four months she spent in Barcelona, how her Spanish got marginally better even after so long there. She tells him about her apartment there, the market she’d walk to on warm days. How she worked for a small fashion editorial while she was there. It wasn’t a big spot, especially since her written Spanish wasn’t up to par. To get the job she had to prove she could write though, and even after getting the job she still finds herself scribbling little sentences in a notebook, whenever inspiration hits.

Dan’s smile curls wider at that, a curious tilt to his head, and Blair regrets it the moment she says it. “I’m no writer, obviously. It’s just a hobby I seemed to hold on to. I don’t even write anything longer than a paragraph. Trust me, whatever idea you’ve managed to concoct in that brain of yours, it’s not nearly as exciting.”

The truth is, the sentences and words she has scratched down in a notebook that’s stuffed into the bottom of her bag, are all things she hears in his voice. Lines and prose that fit with the flow of his tongue, the light in his eyes. They’re words that she thinks of in quiet moments, words that she can imagine in some book sitting in a store window with his name stamped on the cover. Words that fold into poems that fold into love letters, into something private and soft.

Sometimes they’re words she writes to herself, things she’d like to hear, things she can envision him saying.

“Blair Waldorf. Runaway heiress, former Princess, and aspiring author. You know, it has a nice ring to it.”

“Thank you, Humphrey, for condensing all of my failures into one compact sentence. Refined perfectly to pierce through the sliver of a heart I have left.”

Instead of apologizing, he quirks an eyebrow, in that way of his. “I’ve been writing too, if it’s any consolation.”

“It’s not. You’re a writer, I would surely hope you’d be, you know, _writing_.” It didn’t even hurt that much, what he said before. It was the truth, and maybe coming from anyone else it would have stung. But Dan knows just how to twist his voice, how to soften the words, so it feels less like an insult and more like a casual tease.

There’s a beat, where his mouth does that thing, and then he seemingly ignores the comment, starts talking. Which seemed to always be his specialty. Hearing whatever dig she threw at him and deciding to if he wanted to fire back or let it roll right over him.

“My agent, which is someone who is definitely more professional than Alessandra, thought it would be good for me to get out of Boston. She thought I should, I dunno, get inspired. Get out of my ‘slump’ and actually write the third book I keep promising.”

“I wasn’t aware you even published a second book.” There’s genuine surprise when she says this, because she really hadn’t known. The only bookstores she’s frequented recently are the type that carry classics and books that pretentious hipster trash would read. Thinking about it now, Blair can’t remember the last time she stepped into anything equating to a Barnes & Noble.

A small, quiet part reminds Blair that the only books she’s been reading since she marked _Gatsby_ to hell and back have been books that she remembers seeing on Dan’s bookshelves. Vaguely, she remembers she left her worn and red copy of _Gatsby_ back at the hotel. She wonders, quietly as she digs out a small pocket notebook she keeps in her purse at all times, if she can convince Dan to have coffee again, if only to show him the well loved paperback.

“What’s the name of it? I’d love to pick it up the next time I can. _Inside_ was so thrilling, I can only imagine what your second novel could be.” Blair tries to keep the bitterness from her voice. She suspects she succeeded as best as she could when she looks up, pen poised over paper, meeting Dan’s eyes.

Their coffee cups clink together as he gathers them, keeping his hands busy, shifting in his seat. If she didn’t know any better, and she does, she’d say he’s nervous about something. And not in the way he was nervous before, about telling her he was planning a no holds barred exposé that he canceled anyways.

“Humphrey.”

“I don’t think you’d like it. There’s no references to designer labels whatsoever, so don’t worry about it. It wasn’t even that good.”

“ _Dan_. Quit deflecting with empty humble platitudes and tell me the name of your damn book, so I can go and buy it, read it, and then mock you incessantly.”

With a put upon sigh, Dan rubs at the space between his eyebrows, rolling his eyes so hard his head follows their movement. After a full minute of silence, he sighs again, and pulls out his wallet. “Alright, _alright_.” He places down some money, and stands. “But instead of you buying it, I’ll give you one for free. It’s back at my hotel, though.”

Blair follows suit, gathering up her bag, and pointedly splitting the money Dan left on the table in half. “You just carry around extra copies of your own book? And I thought you were pretentious _before_ , Humphrey.” She replaces it with her own bills and hands him back his money with a smile.

“It was my publisher’s idea. They thought it’d be nice if I met anyone, quote unquote, _important_. I could offer them my book and it’s good publicity. Or so I was told.”

“I’m flattered that I’m considered important enough.”

She said it teasingly, much like everything else they say to each other, but as they step away from the cafe, Dan stops her with a brush of his fingers against her wrist. “Of course you are.”

The street around them continues on with life, people walk by and chatter away, the wind whistles through the buildings and some far off shop is pumping out music of some sort, but all Blair can feel is his skin against hers. _He’s nothing but a footnote_ , she tries to remind herself, as she shifts her weight enough so they aren’t quite touching anymore.

Blair didn’t choose him, and he should hate her for that. Shouldn’t he? Why is he standing there, the warm Italian breeze ruffling his curls, a stack of leather bracelets settled on his wrist, and a genuine look on his face. This isn’t how it’s meant to be. He’s supposed to hate her. She’s supposed to sit in a bathtub with half of her face underwater thinking about all the things she’ll never say to him.

But here he is, tangible and real and open. Clearing her throat, she takes another step away. “I need to grab something from my own hotel.”

“Yeah, ok.” Dan straightens, draws his hand back.

 

\---

 

Twenty minutes later, she’s standing in the lobby of her hotel, _The Great Gatsby_ tucked close to her stomach. Dan said he’d meet her here, because apparently it was easier for him to make his way to her hotel, than vice versa.

She wonders if that’s just his way of being nice, so she doesn’t have to traipse to whichever one star hotel he’s found himself in.

The lobby isn’t crowded, which she’s thankful for. Blair isn’t in the mood for people to stare at her, a lonely looking girl with a beat up book held between her and the world like a shield. Her heart feels like it’s jackrabbiting in her chest, so loud it drowns out the trembling that’s crawled itself up behind her sternum. While sitting alone in coffee shops or galleries or bedrooms, she never once truly entertained the idea of actually ever letting Dan see this. This anthology of her thoughts, words scribbled into the margins, sentences outlined, jokes squeezed between paragraphs.

 _Inside_ was his love letter to her, and she supposes in some terribly stereotypical way, this is her love letter to him. That thought alone makes her want to throw the book out before he even gets here, run back up to her room and grab something like a jacket, the excuse for why she had to come back here.

Right as her eyes lock onto a trash can, the front entrance sweeps open and there stands Dan, sunglasses hooked into the collar of his shirt, a book held against his hip as he searches the lobby. His eyes seem to light up when he sees Blair, and he makes a beeline for where she’s standing, head tilting when he gets close enough to catch sight of what she’s holding.

Damn you _Gatsby_.

“You really did read  _The Great Gatsby_?” He asks, already amused if a bit dubious.

Blair flicks her hair over her shoulder, sniffing. “Yes, I did. Multiple times, in fact. I also corrected some of the more run on paragraphs, and added other little bits of information that I feel Fitzgerald could have learned from if he were still alive.” Without much fanfare, Blair shoves the paperback into Dan’s chest, already snatching at the hardcover in his hand. Hoping for a bloodless and quick exchange.

For his part, Dan doesn’t put up any fight with the trade, only staring down at _Gatsby_ once having a hold of it. “Did you put this through the laundry?”

“No.” Blair flushes, fingers digging into the cover of Dan’s book. “I told you, I read it _multiple_ times. Enough times that I swear I can hear Nick Carraway’s voice in my sleep, telling me in so many words how absolutely and unconditionally he loves Gatsby.”

That makes Dan laugh, a quick sound that has his shoulders shaking.

“You can have it. I’m quite done with it by now, there’s no more room left in the book, anyways.” Looking down, Blair finally focuses on the book Dan handed her. It has a silver and white cover, the title in stark font. “Besides, you might learn a thing or two from it.”

“Thank you,” he says, and it sounds so genuine. “Oh, right. I signed the inside of the book by the way. That way you can sell it off as a Dan Humphrey signed first edition whenever you get tired of it.”

“How thoughtful of you.” She holds the book close to her stomach, much in the same way Dan found her, and when she looks at him, he’s already flipping through the paperback.

He closes the book only a moment later, and she can see the thoughtful expression settling onto his face. “Lunch, tomorrow?”

Blair takes a moment to seem as if she’s thinking about it, even though she agreed to it before he even finished his sentence. “Presumptuous of you, but I’ll allow it.”

They agree to meet at the same cafe from earlier, and then Blair is saying goodbye, walking towards the elevators before Dan has even had a chance to leave.

 

\---

 

After a shower and her skin care routine, Blair changes into something comfortable, tamping down the anxious feeling under her heart every time she catches sight of Dan’s novel on her bed. She curls up in the large queen sized bed, sinking into the pillows, and cracks open the cover.

The dedication reads;

 _To the girl who needs to believe in herself_  
_half as much as she believed in me._

 

And directly underneath, in Dan’s messy scrawl;

 _Thank you for everything,_  
_even when it felt like there was something between us_  
_that was so broken it couldn’t be fixed._ _  
I owe you a lot Blair, and I’m not angry anymore._  
_Dan Humphrey_

 

 

The book hasn’t even properly started yet, and here she is, feeling the tell tale pressure build up behind her eyes. Damn him.


	2. Unlucky People

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is a few snippets from the book Dan wrote, mostly the bits that stand out the most to Blair. other bits were just fun to write.

**_Unlucky People_ **  
**_By Dan Humphrey_ **

 

 

Bryce Walden was the type of girl who spent every morning curling her hair, who wore skirts and took the time to paint her nails. She was beautiful, in a manicured way. Perfectly put together and presentable for the world.

There was something ethereal about her, something gossamer that was just under the surface of her iron armor. She was doll like in the way she looked, but her skin was made of steel, her tongue was a knife, and when she smiled it always held a threat.

She was a doll that would bite if you underestimated her.

Bryce was the type of girl who you knew would hurt you, but you fell in love with her anyways. How could you not.

 

\---

 

Your friendship started begrudgingly, but now you could never imagine anyone else as your best friend.

She lays on your bed, chestnut hair fanned out around her face, like a halo. One of your comic books is in her hands, and she flips through it idly, casually, as if the raised voices of your parents can’t be heard through your bedroom door.

You’re sixteen and your parents are getting a divorce.

“I wish I had a cool superpower.” She states, matter of factly, closing the comic book and throwing it at your face.

“You do.” Moving from your spot against your door, you crawl over towards the bed, folding your arms on the mattress. Her eyes are the same color as the fresh ground coffee she prefers. “It’s called being a super bitch.”  
  
Her laughter sounds like something warm and safe wrapping itself around your bones.

You’re sixteen and you’re in love with the girl you consider your best friend.

 

\---

 

She tears herself apart, tries to fit into a role that isn’t quite the right shape. His hand is on her waist, and her smile is stretched too perfectly.

They’re magnets, you think. Snapping together whenever they’re close enough, impossible to separate. It’s love, you know. Love in the way his fingers press into her side and the way she holds on too tight, too tight and never letting go.

It’s intimate in the way that it’s not meant for the public, scandalous and possessive. Epic, people call it. The onlookers that enjoy watching the relationship from the sidelines, like spectators. It’s epic and everlasting, their names combined into one big word.

“I’m happy,” she tells you, and she genuinely is. That’s the part that sits sour in your stomach. She’s happy, and while you can categorize it as toxic and unhealthy, never once has he hurt her.

The only one he’s hurting is _you_ , and you hate yourself for it.

 

\---

 

“When have I ever lied?” Bryce asks, and she continues to rummage through the backseat of your car.

“I don’t think we have the time for a list.” You quip back, your hands stuffed into your pockets.

“To _you_.” She’s exasperated, paying no mind as items tumble from your car, bouncing against the sidewalk. You have to think about it for a minute, really rack your brain.

“Well, _never_ .”   
  
With a triumphant noise, Bryce straightens up, a phone held in her hands. “Exactly. So trust me, ok?”

“Always.”

 

\---

 

Nick steps over you, dropping a beer can onto your chest on his way by. He laughs when you try to grab at his leg, dancing out of the way.

“You’re totally wearing me down, dude. Get drunk and you’ll feel better, I guarantee it.”

“You said the same thing last month with those pot brownies. I didn’t feel better, I felt nauseous and cried for like ten minutes over some video of a cat seeing its owner coming back from the military.”

He plops down next to you, throwing an arm around your shoulder. “In my defence, high or not it was a pretty heart warming story. Seriously though,” and he shakes you, tilts his chin down to the unopened can, “Either you get drunk enough to do something about your very Poe-esque depression, or you can leave.”

Cracking open the can, you nudge him back. “I’m proud of you for making a literary reference.”

“Yeah well, after spending an all nighter writing a stupid essay about the dude, some things are bound to stick.”

 

\---

 

You add three sugars and a healthy amount of creamer, and then you slide the coffee towards her.

Her crying has calmed down, and the collar of your shirt feels like it’s starting to dry, but she still looks sad. Cracked.

Bryce’s fingers curl around the mug, and she sniffles into the steam. “I shouldn’t feel like this, should I?” She asks, and you don’t know how to answer. “Love doesn’t feel like this. It’s not supposed to feel like this.”

No, you want to say. No, love doesn’t feel anything like this. It might leave you hurting sometimes, it might leave you aching, but it shouldn’t guy you completely. Not unless you’re holding onto something you know will never last. Trust me, you want to tell her, I know from experience.

 

\---

 

Times like this, when she’s floating in the water, nothing but the soft glow of the pool illuminating her face, she doesn’t look so broken.

Times like this, she looks like she’s healing, like she’s happy.

She swims over to you, where you’re sitting at the edge, and she rests her elbows on your knees. Your heart clenches. She’s a siren, a mermaid, hair slicked back and beckoning you into the deep, to your fucking death.

“What are you thinking about?”

 _You_.

“How much trouble we’ll be in if your mom catches us.”

She huffs, settling back into the water, elbows slipping away and leaving nothing but wet and warm hands cupping your knees. “Please, if my mother notices at all, she’ll be more upset on my choice of last year’s bathing suit than any breaking and entering.”

You let her pull you into the water, her voice light and filled with laughter. You’d happily let her drown you if it meant you could keep her like this. Unburdened by the life she thinks she needs to live.

 

\---

 

“Bryce,” you hold her hand, try to hold her in this moment. You want to look at her, memorize her, the shape of her cupid’s bow and the one strand of her hair that will always refuse to curl no matter how hard she tries. “You don’t have to run to him.”

She looks sad, and she holds your hand back, small fingers squeezing yours.

“Yes. I do.”

 

\---

 

When you’re twenty years old, you realize that through most of your life, you might have been painting Bryce as someone who needs to be saved. At least to an extent much more than she needs to be.   
  
She comes to you crying when she’s hurting, but she doesn’t change her pattern. She hurts and she breaks, and she picks up her pieces. Fits them back together, uses your words and voice as tape, and then she leaves.

She leaves and you’re alone and she’s still hurting.

You grow up, in the way that any twenty year old grows up. Enough to count towards maturity but not quite filling up any sort of adulthood quota. Still, you can notice the perpetual loop Bryce has stuck herself in.

A groundhog day of epic proportions, except instead of one day, she’s constantly reliving her high school years. Over and over and never letting herself break the cycle.

You love her though, and you want to help her. Because she deserves it. But she deserves it in a way that any person that’s loved deserves help. Not in the way of a storybook girl looking for a hero.

 

\---

 

“I want you. I don’t want anything else. Just you.”

 

\---

 

She tastes like melancholy and salt.

 

\---

 

You had her in your hands, her porcelain pieces melding themselves back together bit by bit.

You had her and you loved her. You thought that if you loved her enough, kissed her enough, knew the way she liked her coffee and the way she organizes the books on your shelf by author, that you would keep her.

If you gave her everything you had, she’d find her happiness. She’d realize she’s worth everything the world has to offer and more. She’s worth happiness.

And you lost her.

 

\---

 

You watch as she gets into the town car, not once looking behind her, at you standing in the cold New York winter.

She gets into a car that you could never afford, with a man that you could never be. She loves him and she leaves with him. She chooses him every time, unwavering.

She doesn’t love you and it’s ok.

_It’s ok._

 


	3. Part 2

"What kind of ending is this, Humphrey?" Blair Waldorf storms over to the table he’s sitting at, not waiting for any sort of invitation. He wouldn't have expected anything less, to be honest. "Why's it so..." voice wavers for a moment, and her fingers tighten around the book. "Sad?"   
  
“You know why." Dan sighs, closing the ragged copy of _The Great Gatsby_ Blair had given to him the day before. He doesn’t say anything else, just stares at her until she huffs and sits down across from him. "Because Blair Waldorf can never let herself have a happy ending.”   
  
Blair starts, tipping forward, hands on the table. "You _know_ Louis wasn't my fault. How could you even say such a thing-"   
  
"Louis turning into an actual disney villain wasn't your fault, no. But you didn't even have to marry him Blair. Instead of running away into the sunset with Chuck, you convinced yourself that some promise you made to God trumped every single one of your feelings. And don't even get me started on everything with Chuck. Things get so bad around you and instead of getting out while you can, you try to soldier through it, like your unrelenting faith in Chuck Bass will show everyone how strong you are."   
  
Sometime during his rant, Blair slumped back into her seat, as much as Blair could ever slump, book held in her lap. "Chuck and I were complicated." She tries to defend herself, but even she can tell how weak of an excuse it is.   
  
"Because you _made_ it complicated." There's a silence after that, as Dan crosses his arms, and Blair continues to hold the book close. They stare at each other, and Dan sighs again. "There wasn't a happy ending Blair because I write what I know. And what I know, is that a happy ending was never meant for us."

“So you admit it was about us. That I was Bryce, a tornado of a girl who self destructs and Damen, a boy who makes things seem much more poetic than they have any right to be.”

“I write what I know,” he stresses, because it’s true. “And I know you. _Us_.”

“Well, I reject this narrative.”

“Excuse me?” He might be a tad incredulous. What right does she have to reject what he’s written, what was _published._

Blair repeats herself, standing up from the table, waving off a waiter that was on their way over. “Your ending is trite and stereotypical and honestly just depressing.” She gathers her bag, fitting the hardcover into it. “Bryce Walden may have fit neatly into the trope of sad pretty broken girl who destroys herself, but I am a very real person. I’m real, Dan. And I reject your ending.”

She stands there, looking chic and dazzling as ever, and it hits Dan in that moment, that he never stopped loving her. Which should have been obvious, thanks to an entire book written about her, _again_. But it’s always been a low burning feeling, a vague buzzing in the back of his skull. The sky is blue, the Statue of Liberty was a gift from the french, he loves Blair Waldorf. A fact of life.

“Ok?” He sits for a few more seconds, until he realizes she’s not moving. She’s not sitting back down or leaving. Just staring at him, eyes slightly narrowed.

Finally, she snaps out a “ _well?_ ”, and he’s standing up, pushing his chair in. Following her because that’s what he does best. They leave the cafe, and he walks beside her down the street. Her hair is shorter now, curling above the slope of her shoulder, and he has to stop himself from reaching out, tucking a wave behind her ear.

She smells the same though, there’s a bunch of little differences he’s noticed but she smells the same. Like strawberries and linen, a clear spring day.

When he first saw her, yesterday by the _Trevi Fountain_ , for a split second he thought his mind conjured her up. Like just being in Italy, being in Rome and thinking about her was enough for his imagination to construct some mirage of her. In a cream skirt that reached her knees and a tasteful camisole under a fuzzy looking sweater. She looked expensive and touchable, like how he always remembered her.

Now, she’s wearing pants and a blouse and flats that probably have too many zeros in the price tag. She still looks expensive, touchable. But in a more grown up way, and he hopes it means she finally knows who she wants to be.

“Is that how you see me?” She asks, voice soft and quiet. Cutting into any thoughts he had of how she stood glowing in front of the fountain.

“What?”

“Bryce. Is that how you see me? Broken.”

It takes him a moment, a moment to really look at her, staring ahead, mouth in a straight line but eyes swimming and filled with emotion. “A little.” Her fingers knot themselves together. “But you’re fixable. Not like Bryce. Bryce never wanted to be fixed.”

“And what, you’re going to fix me, Dan?”

“No.” He refuses to lie to her. That’s one thing they’ve never really done to each other. Even when other people would, they’ve always doled out the honest truth, no matter how blunt. “You’ll fix yourself. I’m just here for moral support.” He bumps his shoulder into hers, and it jostles a smile out of her, the exact response he was looking for.

Blair nods to herself, a small gesture. “I like the sound of that.”

 

\---

 

“We’ve been walking for like, ten minutes Blair. Where are we going? What are we _doing_?”

They’ve stopped in front of another fountain, much smaller than the _Trevi_ , with little to no crowd milling about. An old couple snaps a few pictures of it, smiling at each other, and shuffle away.

“I may have been dragging you around while I worked up the nerve.” She answers, if a bit cryptically.

“The nerve for what?”

“To change the end to your terrible novel. I don’t want my story to end like that, for some cheesy quotable sentence to wrap it all up. I don’t want it to be ok, Dan.”

“I’m really trying to keep up but this whole cryptic thing really doesn’t suit you.”

Blair huffs, glaring at him. “ _She doesn’t love you and that’s ok_ .” She quotes the ending to his novel. “It’s _not_ ok.”

The fountain gently burbles at their feet, and there’s a pounding in his pulse as he look at her, as he process her words. “Why not?”   
  
“Because you’re wrong, we should get a happy ending. Because I _wan_ t a happy ending.”

One moment she’s standing in front of Dan, defiant, and the next she’s against his chest, stretching up and covering his mouth with her own.

She tastes like spearmint gum and coming home.

Words whispered against his lips, “because I love you and I’m sorry.”

 

===

 

“Dan.” She calls out, from where she’s sitting on the bed, her copy of _Unlucky People_ in her hands. She can see him through the doorway, scribbling on a brightly colored post-it note before slapping it onto the fridge.

Hopefully it’s something short and sweet, a mini love letter left for her to find later.

“What?”

“Come in here, you ofe. Yelling from different rooms is impolite.”

Dan makes his way into the bedroom, clad in sweatpants and nothing else. It’s one of Blair’s favorite looks on him. Rumpled and comfortable. “Weren’t you the one to yell first?”

“Technicalities.” She flips to a different page. “You called Serena golden. _Golden and bright, like a sun burning_.” She lowers the book, looking up at him with a small frown. In her silk pajamas and hair pulled back into a ponytail, she’s ready for bed. But instead of getting under the covers, she decided to do some rereading. And now with the author himself at her fingertips, there's a wealth of answers to her questions.  

The mattress dips as he sits on the edge. “Is that what you wanted to ask?”

Blair sniffs. “Maybe.”

“Are you jealous?”

“ _No._ ”

Crawling further into bed, he takes the book from her hands. “It’s the hair, I’m pretty sure. It causes everyone to think of her as golden. Besides, you’re silver. Stark and gleaming and objectively the prettier metal.”

“Silver means second place.”

“Only in the Olympics, and last I checked you’re not a professional athlete so you don’t need to worry.”

The look she levels him with could wilt a lesser man, or really anyone who hasn’t been dealing with her for years and thus has built up a tolerance. She tries to narrow her eyes, intensifying the glare, but Dan just smiles, indulgently. He pulls her closer, arms wrapping around her shoulders.

“You’re silver like the moon, Blair. Like some sort of night time Goddess.” She can’t help but return the smile, pressing it into the space above his collarbone. It spurs him on. “Besides, silver can kill werewolves, and even burns vampire’s in certain lore. Can gold do that?”

“Oh, wonderful. So I’m your protection ward against all things supernatural?” She tries to push at his chest, to wiggle away even as her voice is laced in something on the edges of fondness.

Dan tips them both sideways, holding Blair even closer as she begins to laugh. “I need to keep you around for some reason, don’t I?” And then he’s kissing her, swallowing the sounds of her laughter, and she feels something warm and safe pool in her chest, further drowning that rattling something that lived tucked away in her ribs, filling in the gaps and crevices, silencing it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had a version of the last section written in Dan's pov, but it didn't feel right. like I made such a point of this being Blair's story, so I just had to end it with her voice. I hope you liked it!! it's shorter than the first chapter, but it felt like the tight place to end it


End file.
